IS IT WORTH IT? Of course, not every old-fashioned process works in the modern world. Ever tried making your own salt by evaporating seawater, or not washing your hair like the Native Americans did? At Portland, Oregon, deli Kenny & Zuke's there's been some backsliding on the road to authenticity.

Examples of factory pastrami, left and center, and CHOW's homemade version

And yet a week's worth of curing is a long time. Imagine you're burning through, say, 2,000 pounds of pastrami a week. How are you going to keep up? And where are you going to find the walk-in space? Such were the problems for Kenny & Zuke's. Add to that the fact that Gordon has designs on Whole Foods—he hopes eventually to get FDA approval to package his pastrami to sell to retailers.

And so, there have been some tweaks to Kenny & Zuke's traditional-ness. To shave a few days off the curing process, it's injected. Gordon says this is a minor adjustment—his pastramis still cure for a week, before smoking for 10 hours.

Berkeley's Levitt has started injecting, too. He was a pastrami purist, but these days he says he doesn't think the old-timey wet brine makes any difference to the taste of the meat.

And a week after opening their brick-and-mortar delicatessen, Wise Sons' Evan Bloom is already thinking about how he can speed up the curing process.

The revivalists' pastrami still tastes great, though. It still sells like crazy. And it's still handmade. After all, Gordon's and Levitt's employees are the ones holding the syringe. For now.

Somebody tell the gorilla that he can come back for a pastrami sandwich.